1 What will be, will be
Cock-a-doodle-do! The roosters' crow gave him a rude awakening from his slumber.
"Damn you! That's was a good one!" He cursed the Fates from under his breath, he was having a dream, a good one for a change.
It was just about springtime, the birds were singing, flowers blooming and the trees whistling, but regardless of the season
Antonio had been haunted with nightmares for decades.
Even the rays of sunshine faintly flickering through the curtains couldn't barter him from the lie that it was going to be a beautiful day. He was a Watchman and he knew better!
Sitting on the roof of the Almudena Cathedral he watched as people went about their daily businesses.
All the hustle and bustle, all the struggle, the rat race, everyone trying to buy as much time as possible, make as much money as they could but..." Que Será, Será" so the saying goes, this was his mantra
This was the mantra of the Watchmen.
You couldn't add a second to your life, you couldn't make a dime more than the Fates had given you at your birth.
"Rats! Measly rats! That's what you all are
Running the rat race!" he muttered with a growl and a scowl on his face.
He looked way older than he was because of constant frowning. He was just a young man in his early thirties.
Antonio de Castillo was a well-built man with bushy dark hair, apparently hastily combed, his fingers constantly running through his unkempt beards
"Common! Don't call them that! Give them a break, let them believe, let them hope. Even though that hope is worthless". Jorge mockingly interjected while taking a huge puff of his Cuban cigar.
Antonio didn't realize he spoke so loudly to the hearing of his best and only friend for years; Jorge.
Antonio de Castillo had always been alone from childhood, his parents were never home and he lost both parents to suicide at a very young age, or was it suicide?
He now knew better, it was meant to be, it was their job and there was nothing he or they could do about it.
That is the burden of being a Watchman. You knew everything! The beginning, the end, the when, the where, and how each occurrence would take place;
You knew about the devastating lows that would follow an extraordinary high years before they came to pass.
You knew everyone's fate, except your own.
The Fates would spring a few surprises here and there and there were some grey areas, but these didn't usually change the plot of one's life.
How many toddlers had he watched being crushed by oncoming vehicles, people choose a bad elevator that would lose them their dream jobs, young women fall in love with serial killers, people walk right into the path of stray bullets!
All it would have taken was a little tug to distract for a second and they would be saved.
Just last night he Watched as a 21-year-old female law student left the club with a young boy who would eventually rape her to death alongside 8 of his friends!
Her cries for help still echoed in his ears, but he wouldn't dare do anything about it.
All he could do was watch over it and even ensure its completion or else there would be grave consequences for him and all under his "Watch".
As he had come to learn over time... "Que Será, Será"! "What will be, will be".
The Fates had never been kind to him, all he knew was struggle, bouncing through foster homes and juvenile detention centers he had learned to fend for himself and battle through life till his time came.
Nothing startled him, nothing could bring him joy, all he knew was pain. Pain was a close friend, and so was Jorge.
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Jorge was a free spirit. A tall, handsome, young man about the same age as Antonio. He had blonde curly hair, big brown eyes, and a smile that would turn a lady's knees to jelly.
He grew up in a wealthy home in Malaga, his father, a Watchman in his time had taught him how to be one himself.
He taught him how to submit to and be ready for everything the Fates had planned.
This helped him live a happy life, although "The Fates" had a way of "getting under ones' skin" ultimately.
Jorge was one of the few "surprises" the Fates brought Antonio's way.
One of the few things he was glad for and one of the few grey areas he was glad for
Jorge had always been one to brighten up the atmosphere, even on the darkest of days Jorge would find something to laugh about, and he would make you laugh also...
He was the one who taught Antonio how to be a true Watchman and how to live life, even if Antonio decided to trudge through it.
He helped rid Antonio of hatred for life and his fellow man and even though Antonio still detested a lot of things.
He had come to accept his assignment and was ready to see it through.
But even with all the impact, Jorge had on Antonio, he could not rid him of his hatred for "The Timekeepers"!
Antonio met Jorge sixteen years ago, at a time when the Timekeepers reigned supreme and their activities were at an all-time high all over the world.
During one of Antonio's several failed attempts to save two people under his watch... (His Parents). He asked a renowned Timekeeper named Sergio Gerard to help save them, but it always ended the same way; their deaths!
No matter how many attempts he made or variables he tried, they always died as and when they were determined by the Fates to.
A Timekeepers had power over time, they could stop, slow down, fast forward or even rewind time at their will, both for themselves and for others if you needed it to be done.
Timekeepers believed that a man's fest was in his hands, that man had the power to change the course of his life through his actions.
This was against the code of the Watchmen. Most Timekeepers used their ability to help others or for financial gain.
Sergio Gerard had Antonio and his parents stuck in a time loop so that anytime Antonio's parents would die, time would rewind itself, giving Antonio another chance to save his parents.
This had adverse effects on the ripples of time and destinies of so many of which Sergio didn't care who was affected.
All he cared about was his selfish gain.
Sergio made Antonio pay huge amounts of money till he had nothing left.
Little did Antonio know that Sergio had been deceiving him all the while.
Antonio was unfamiliar with the rules guiding the life of a Watchman;
A Watchman couldn't know the details of his own life
Any attempt to in any way help anyone under his "Watch" especially fellow Watchmen would result in them still eventually die and the former Watchmen turning into "The Sleepless" or "insomne"; These were the undead.
They would hunt their Watchman, kill him and then kill as many Watchmen as they could until they were killed themselves.
And they could not be killed unless burnt with the fires of Tenerife.
All these Sergio knew, yet he kept defrauding Antonio until he met Jorge who taught him the ways of the Watchmen and helped in releasing his parents who had become insomne and were seeking to kill him.
Jorge also hunted down and killed Sergio as revenge on behalf of his friend who was distraught at the time.
In addition to their extraordinary abilities, Watchmen and Timekeepers were skilled fighters and marksmen.
It was an abomination for Watchmen and Timekeepers to associate in any way whatsoever.
If they were caught, they would both be tied to a stake and burnt by their respective groups.
These rules resulted in agelong feuds and bloodshed between the two leagues.
They were both well connected and funded.
Antonio's hatred for Timekeepers was greater than anything one could ever imagine.
He swore to kill every Timekeeper whether old or young. That was his life's aim.
Many years had passed since the death of his parents but his hatred for the Timekeepers fueled a hunger that drove him to excellence in all he did.
He pushed himself to become faster and stronger than all the Watchmen in his time.
He was hired for jobs in and out of Europe, even across the different continents.
There was almost no European shore the sole of his feet hadn't tread upon due to his hundred percent success in killing the Timekeepers contracted to him.
This trend of brutal excellence earned him the Nickname "Ángel de la Muerte" meaning "Angel of death" among the League of Watchmen and Timekeepers alike.
He was dreaded by all who knew him.
Even the Barons who lead the League of Watchmen and also Time Keepers avoided dreaded Antonio. The Angel de la Muerte
His rise to prominence coincided with the fall of the Timekeepers, who were now scared to reveal their identities for fear of a visit from "Ángel de la Muerte".
Timekeeper activities went underground and cases of time warps became a rarity.
The only problem was that rumors of a mysterious White Angel who took delight in killing Watchmen began to spread.
This information posed a threat to the power and influence League of Watchmen on humanity in general.
So they contracted Antonio to track down and kill the White Angel of the Timekeepers.
Even with this, the cases of either dead or Watchmen were on the rise.
Antonio was looked up to by all to find and end this menace called the white Angel before things got out of hand.
He searched far and wide, in a bid to track down this mysterious person, yet he was no closer to finding out who or where this person was.
To make things worse, there was the issue of the Prophesy of Tears which said that "a child would be born out of an abominable union between a Watchman and Timekeeper and the fruit of this union will lead to the end of the world as we know it!
THE APOCALYPSE!"
